We have been asked give some advice on the use of Conversation Exchange, based on something like 4 years' experience of Russian-English exchange with 10 or so partners, both in person and over the Internet.
To start off, you should be clear from the beginning what you were looking to get out of the exchange and what exactly you could offer in return.
It is useful to have defined topics of conversation to avoid either having the same conversation time after time or getting into details of one's life, thoughts and feelings that one would not necessarily want to share with a stranger or chance acquaintance. The aim is really to keep a level of linguistic discomfort that helps you to learn things that might not be entirely straightforward. One way of doing this is to set a target of I am going to learn (say) five new things during this conversation–if you meet your target, it really doesn't matter how many mistakes you make or how stupid you feel.
I think you need either a reasonable level of the target language (I think that the site used to say that you needed Upper Intermediate for conversation to be any good–compare the definitions) or a degree of linguistic sophistication so as to make use of material you didn't necessarily understand immediately.
It is probably also a good idea to explicitly agree on how long the session is going to last and to split the time so that half of it is spent in language A and half in language B. There is always a tendency to drift into chatting in the language with the stronger learner (let's say it's language A), which of course minimises overall effort but then not speaking to foreigners at all reduces it still further. So you should have discussion of points in language B and correction of mistakes in language B in language B, to avoid getting into language A as a lingua franca.
There is a tendency for some people to want their conversation partners to teach them language X, which is generally not realistic unless the partner is a language teacher by trade–and if they are, then they ought to be paid for their work.
Following the general rules for meeting people on sites of various kinds, you should avoid criticising other people you have met there (because the person you are talking to will fear you criticising them to others) and certainly give it up immediately if what is going on makes you feel uncomfortable at a personal level. More on this here.
There are also a number of practical points, which may apply especially to sessions of Internet contact. It's best to have a set time each week, because then you're subconsciously preparing yourself for it. It's very difficult to arrange things on the fly with someone who is essentially a stranger–you don't know what constraints they are operating under or what their conventions are regarding punctuality. If you're dealing with somebody from another cultural background, while it may be clear to you that at five o'clock means some convenient time before 5:30–how are they meant to know that?
The experience of playing competitive (club) chess again after a break of 30 years gives rise to some interesting reflections.
It's easy to decide that the whole thing is pointless. Over the past three decades, computers have if not totally solved chess then reached the stage of being able to play better than any human player ever could. In addition, while 30 years ago one merely weak, now one is weak old, slow and stupid.
In addition, it is certainly true that chess is a negative-sum game, in that the pain of defeat is greater than the joy of victory. There are some rare cases where both sides get pleasure from a well-played draw and some very rare cases where even the loser feels he has played well and so is pleased with his efforts, but these hardly detract from the general point.
This is different from sports such as rugby (where you might not even know the score as the game progresses) and tennis, where you can have a healthy run around the court even in defeat.
A long time ago Aristotle asked of tragedy why people took pleasure in witnessing events that would be extremely distressing in real life. His answer, which seems still to be the correct one, is that working out of these experiences in watching a play enabled one gto better deal with them or the threat of them in real life.
–how you make difficult decisions when there is no time to do a proper job.
It is not clear how far what you learn here is easily transferable to real life, but the insights gained can hardly help. Responding to the old, slow, weak and stupid point, the interesting thing here is that these learning experiences originate from the levels of conscious incompetence or conscious competence. When you have reached the level of unconscious competence, so that you do as well as you're going to without thinking about it, you don't really get this kind of learning. The same is true of foreign languages for instance–much of the educational value comes at the beginning when you realise that there really are different ways of doing things from those you take for granted.
Along the same lines, it is true that chess tends to be played by young males in the same way that they do maths homework–some do it better and more quickly because they are cleverer, but very few want to grapple with situations where there are many ways of tackling a complex problem. Which approach leads to difficulties when they start doing maths tutorial problems at university.
Now the kind of insights to be gained from playing chess are much more useful to the the old, slow, weak and stupid fraternity and have actual lives and real decisions to take than to the young, fast, strong and clever who do not.
Rachel Montagu is again running an Advanced Biblical Hebrew course as detailed below.
These classes work in the time-honoured fashion: each student in turn reads a verse aloud and then translates it, with input from the teacher as necessary. She also provides some background and interpretation from traditional Jewish teaching.
The emphasis is certainly on understanding the text rather than grammar as such. In my experience, there have been perhaps an average of seven or so students coming to lessons. The level things are taken at tends to depend on who the students are, while the fee per term might be something around £110-£130, depending on circumstances. At about £ 10 per 2-hour session this certainly looks like good value!
In principle, students should have covered the material in the First Hebrew Primer from Eks before starting this class. If you know the qal conjugation (perfect and imperfect) pretty well for verbs with three strong roots (the 'regular' ones if you like) and have some idea about hiphil and niphal and verbs with weak roots, that will probably do.
If you want to know more, you can email Rachel; or feel free to email me if you're feeling shy. I've also shared just about everything I know about studying Biblical Hebrew with the world here.
And furthermore it's a question of what age you acquire the characteristics of your speech, so for me you've got Teesside (ages 8-18 say) and possibly the Isle of Man (5-8 perhaps) but nothing for Sarf London (2-3 ish and 29-58).
But in summary–for my case–since even the existence of Teesside is only weakly acknowledged in Yorkshire and County Durham and hardly at all further afield, I find this seriously impressive!
Of course, it also helps if you read what it says, which is The map shows places where answers most closely match your own, based on more than…respondents who said they were from Ireland or Britain.
My inititial view was that you acquire your accent/pronunciation from the other children you go to school with, but I don't know whether that applies quite so definitively to vocabulary.
The way that people speak — the particular words they use and how they sound — is deeply tied to their sense of identity. And it's not just about geography. Education, gender, age, ethnicity and other social variables influence speech patterns, too.
And you can always try again–I don't think it shows you exactly the same 25 questions each time and you can change your mind about doubtful cases. I ended up with an overall conclusion of the North in general, the North-East in particular and specifically Teesside.
I need to ask you if you know people who would like to go (or return) to Perm. Many of you know what is involved, although of course it changes slightly from year to year.
One point – as far as possible that person should have an Oxford/Oxon connection. Local residents, people who are close, people who are/were at the universities, students at the Department for Continuing Education, people with relatives here, etc.
That doesn't mean that we are ruling out ideal people from further away, just that we hope to select as many as possible with some kind of Oxford connection. After all, it is Oxford which is twinned with Perm.
The Russian and Eurasian Studies Centre together with Oxford University's Department for Continuing Education is arranging for a group of eight people to visit Perm as guests of the Perm State University. They will live in families with at least one English speaker and will have many opportunities to observe real Russian life. The visit is part of an exchange scheme in which the payment made by you supports the visit of a Perm teacher to Oxford.
Perm is Oxford's twin city in Russia so the visit is open chiefly to people in Oxfordshire or with an Oxford connection such as attendance at OUDCE summer schools. Others will be considered if we do not fill all places. The programme of the fortnight can vary according to individual interests. As guests of Perm University you will be asked to talk to University students, while your activities can include: visits around the city, and to the Urals countryside; canoeing along the Silva river; professional and specialist contacts with economists, lawyers, local politicians, (and lectures if you are willing and able); visits to art galleries, concerts, ballet; studying the work of the city council and local voluntary groups; taking part in family life with your hosts and their friends. Previous visitors on this scheme have seized all sorts of opportunities to see how Russian society works. Several have returned for a second visit.
DATES: Saturday 7th September to Sunday 22nd September 2019 (Fifteen nights) The journey is by British Airways scheduled flight to Moscow. You will travel from Moscow to Perm by train – about 900 miles and the first day of the Trans-Siberian route. You will have a few hours in Moscow on the return journey.
COST: £1050 This includes air fares, train fares, other travel in Russia, accommodation with a family, breakfast and many other meals, a programme of activities including two visits to the opera or ballet, and two full day tours. It does not include visas, insurance, and some cheap meals. We will arrange your visas and inform you in June of the cost. Currently official visas are £50 plus admin and special delivery postage – in total about £85. You will need to go to London to give your fingerprints, but otherwise it should be straightforward.
We have been asked for some further planning assumptions to go with the original set. These are given below.
The optimistic assumption would be that Brexit does not happen or happens in a way that is not harmful so some of the correction is recovered from what had been priced in on that account. So say a loss of 10%. And the middle option would be 20%.
The most optimistic figure that has been canvassed is 3.5%, but this is surely too optimistic in the circumstances. Say 3%, with a middle figure of 2%.
The question here is really what the difference between inflation and interest rates will be. The BoE forecasts suggest a real interest rate of around -2%, as at present. To be more scientific, real interest rates are currently something like -1.75% (0.75% Bank Rate – 2.5% inflation). The BoE forecasts tend to imply a real interest rate of about -2%, but it would depend on how the rate was adjusted to counter inflation. Say -2.5%/-2%/-1.5% for pessimistic/middle/optimistic.
As for inflation itself, the optimistic forecast would be that MPC manages to hold inflation to say 2.5% over the period, giving overall inflation of 13%. So we take 22% as the middle point.
There seems to be no room for variation here.
If one assumes 2.5 % inflation then the only room for growth even under the 'triple lock' would be if earnings rose faster than inflation. The latest ONS figures show essentially no real growth in earnings over the period from 2005 (!), so one cannot expect any real increase there either.
Hard to see any room for giveaways here!
Too make things easy for ourselves, we assume that in the optimistic case these survive for the next 5 years, while in the middle case half of them do.
The pessimistic scenario reflects a coherent view of unmediated Brexit plus asset price correction while the optimistic scenario also reflects a coherent (but unlikely) outcome where Brexit is rendered harmless. It is hard to give such a definite interpretation to the middle scenario and as such it should be treated with caution.
The treatment of tax and pension changes as proxied by >60 concessions is very likely insufficient–at the very least, one could consider allowances as being constant in nominal terms, thus reducing in real terms.
The present treatment also implicitly assumes that things remain as they are for the remainder of 2018-19, which is certainly open to challenge.
Having grown tired of insomnia, our client has now fled the Civil Service and hopes to avoid starvation by a combination of his investments in bonds and equities, a Civil Service Pension (soon) and a State Pension (not so soon).
Meanwhile, I need to make some concrete plans without knowing exactly what is going to happen around Brexit and indeed asset price correction generally. I would like some planning assumptions–the idea is to give a solid basis for planning on the basis that things should not realistically be worse than this.
ii) they are phenomenological, based on observed correlations more than causal modelling.
The point about a policy response is that it can spread the effect out to different times or different people but cannot in general create value from nothing. So this is really a question of distributional effects–who gets how much of the pain and when–rather than the quantum.
As for correlations, there are times when you need to produce numbers and don't have time to model the economic universe in detail. The effect size claimed is similar to that of the credit crunch of 2007/08, which is the nearest–if hardly most similar–comparator.
In summary, our advice would be to look not so much towards the destruction of value (something between significant and staggering) to be expected over the next year but at the effect changed circumstances might have on the revaluation of pensions.
Applying this set of assumptions to my circumstances, I come to the conclusion that I would lose money that I can afford to lose, which is irritating but no worse than that.
There's nothing like a satisfied client! But we can hardly say we have always been in the Brexit loop. On our first encounter, we took three days to work out what it was, and a further two to decide it could hardly happen.
This analysis has now been extended here.
We were asked by a Russian contact to recommend an English dictionary. I think I would plump for the Concise OED.
Naturally enough, both dictionaries of American English and dictionaries for learners of English are beyond my ken. A very long time ago (probably before I left school) I got myself a Concise OED. When I had worn that out I got a copy of the Chambers dictionary (in 1989) on the grounds that it had more words. The corresponding Wikipedia article has a different opinion, but as they say it depends on how you count entries.
Anyway the single-volume candidates that a native (but non-specialist) English speaker would use seem to be the Concise OED and the offerings from Collins and Chambers.
I had a look at what was available in the shops today. As for new words, the Concise OED had entries for hashtag and flashmob (as flash mob) while the Collins Reference dictionary didn't (although it was published later). It also had something useful to say about the stressing of controversy, while the Collins Reference didn't do pronunciation at all. The large Collins was covered in cellophane while there was no sign of the Chambers.
Back home, I was able to compare some bits of the large Collins and the COED on Amazon. The Collins annoyed me by including encyclopedia-style entries, which I don't like, while for the terms aorist and accusative the Collins tended to flap around giving examples while the COED gave concise, pointed definitions.
While I can't judge how up-to-date the Chambers is on the basis of my 1989 copy, the definitions of aorist and accusative there are a lot better than the ones in Collins if not quite as good as the Oxford ones.
iii) are taken as the default in libraries and schools.
So in general you would take the suitable size Oxford dictionary as your default and look to something else only if you had particular needs. The Concise OED also happens to be cheaper than the other candidates.
Turning now to the Internet, if you've got a word that refers to something reasonably definite and you're dealing with widely-used languages (like English and Russian), your best bet is often to turn to Wikipedia where you can see a picture/chemical formula/mathematical definition/Linnean binominal and compare what the corresponding articles say in the two languages.
Nowadays, if I find that I don't know an English word it tends to be something I can either look up on Wikipedia or find in the Urban Dictionary. And there are also resources like OneLook that will search the free online versions of numerous dictionaries for you.
My visit to Southampton was marked by the normal provincial routine of inflated prices, offhand service and disappearing change. I say nothing of dirt, grease and cracked crockery.
The Premier Inn (Cumberland Lodge) proved to be a remarkable experience, even ignoring the automatic door that opened with deathly slowness as you tried to gain admittance. Upon arriving, I signed up for a £ 9-50 breakfast and paid with a £ 20 note, for which I got £1-00 back, until I protested.
Then check-out was at midday on the following day. At ten o'clock I went out to the shops and when I got back…they had taken my stuff away. Eventually after protestations I was admitted to the linen room and got some of it back.
Surely taking people's things away without asking is theft?
So when I finally decided to depart shortly before midday I had a sudden urge to go back and check that I hadn't left anything behind, but the keycard had been deactivated.
When I checked out I was asked how things had been and I said they had been difficult for the reasons above. The reception staff searched briefly for an Internet address and then said I could find it myself so as to complain, there was nothing they could do for me.
Following our previous experiences, we can only say: don't go to Southampton and if you do, don't stay in a hotel.
Once my Conversation Exchange partner Kseniya (from the provincial town of X, well-known in 19th century literature) and I discussed the proper use of that resource. I had some opinions as set out here.
Kseniya felt that these points were of frightening irrelevance. She thought that it was very difficult to find an English speaker who wanted to practise Russian and many of those you did find were in fact just looking for a woman.
I said that there were plenty of sites for that and these days you could surely speak to your intended via Skype on one of those. She had asked one of her undesired contacts about this and he had said that all the women there were crazy. I also said that she could look for female conversation partners, but they were apparently likely to want to talk about clothes and cosmetics.
She asked me why such men were looking for women particularly from Russia or Ukraine. I said that since I wasn't one of them I didn't really know.
Anyway, the aim of the present study is to see whether there is evidence of men looking to use CE specifically to make contact with women from Russia/Ukraine (that is, Russian speakers) rather than to enhance their language skills.
iii) This excess is greater for ENG->RUS than for comparator languages.
Here by ENG->RUS and so on we mean English speakers seeking to exchange with Russian speakers. From the data at https://wp.me/pBfTB-28k we take Portuguese, Italian, Turkish and Japanese as comparators, because they seem to be languages of similar importance and popularity to Russian among English speakers and also to avoid excessive labour in counting instances.
Now then, Italian is really only spoken in Italy and Switzerland, so it is hard to see the excess men here all looking for an exploitative relationship with a woman from a poor country.
We can also see from the data above that a great many of the users of CE do not claim to be at a level to make use of it effectively. But we can compare the difference in the percentage of M and F declaring themselves to be below Upper Intermediate level. For instance, with regard to those seeking Russian speakers (Table 1), 93.93 % of men assign themselves to a level below UI as opposed to 92.04% of women, a difference of +1.88%, indicating that the men report themselves as less linguistically advanced than the women. Similarly, the ratio of M to F here is 5.07.
These results are illustrated in Figure 1 above. We see that by comparison with the other languages considered, those seeking Russian are marked by a large number of men relative to women and a large number of these men assigning themselves to lower levels of proficiency.
To summarise: this study provides support to the hypothesis that such men were looking for women particularly from Russia or Ukraine.


The Administration and Finance Department consists of the office of the City Manager and the various finance offices that are under the direction of the city's Finance Director.
The Building and Zoning Office consists of the Zoning Administrator and is within the Planning and Development Department.
The Office of Community and Economic Development (OCED), located in the Department of Planning and Development, is responsible for the City's community and economic development projects and programs.
The Hermitage Department of Fire/Rescue is headed by the Fire Marshal, assisted by the deputy Fire Marshal, and consists of over forty highly-trained, certified volunteer fire fighters, EMTs, instructors and investigators.
The Parks and Recreation Department is headed by the Director, and is responsible for the maintenance and operation of City owned and operated recreation facilities.
The mission of the Hermitage Police Department is to serve, protect, and enhance the quality of life of its citizens and all who work or visit here, through providing police services as well as the constitutional, ethical and impartial enforcement of Pennsylvania laws and City of Hermitage Ordinances with reasonableness and compassion.
Learn more about recycling and solid waste in the city of Hermitage.
The Street Department is headed by the Superintendent, assisted by the Foreman, and consists of nineteen employees.
The Water Pollution Control Division of the Public Works Department is headed by the Superintendent, assisted by the Assistant Superintendent, and consists of sixteen employees, including a Laboratory Technician and an Environmental Operations Coordinator.
The Zoning Office consists of the Zoning Administrator and is within the Planning and Development Department. The office reviews all requests for building permits, issues permits, enforces the City's zoning ordinance and related regulations, and assists the public with questions relating to City requirements and processes for building projects.


The settlement of Englishmen at Jamestown in 1607 was the outgrowth of a vision of transatlantic expansion which had been growing stronger steadily during the preceding generation. It was in the following of that vision that Queen Elizabeth granted to a group of men headed by Sir Walter Raleigh the authority to establish a colony upon the remote shores of the Atlantic ocean, and out of the plans of this group came the ill fated colony which was started at Roanoke Island, in what is now the State of North Carolina, in the year 1585. This colony after a life of a few years disappeared: whether destroyed by Indian attack, or by a Spanish fleet which resented the settlement of Englishmen in a land that was claimed for Spain, or by famine or disease, no one knows to this day. The one permanent result was the giving of the name Virginia to their American land in honor of their Queen.
Following the failure of this first effort, a plan was formulated and established by charter given by King James in the year 1606. Under this charter companies were to be formed in order to found two English settlements in America; one to be a colony at some point between the 34th and 41st degrees of latitude, and the other between the 38th and 45th degrees. Both companies had the widespread interest of the English people, and both made settlements in America in the same year, 1607. The Virginia Company established its settlement at Jamestown, from which developed the Colony, and later the Commonwealth of Virginia, as the first permanent English settlement in America. The Plymouth Company made its settlement upon the coast of what is now Maine; but this effort failed and the colonists returned home in the following year. Permanent settlement of New England began in 1620 with the coming of the Pilgrims to Plymouth, Massachusetts. From these two first settlements thus widely separated, but with their common ideal of English civilization and English concepts of freedom and self government, has grown the American nation of today. This nation, while welcoming all the gifts and values which people of other nations have brought to the enrichment and broadening of our common life, is still basically an English or Anglo Saxon nation.
Many impelling motives animated the men who organized the Virginia company and labored for the establishment of a colony in America. They wanted of course the expansion of British trade and a wider market for British manufactures; and they naturally hoped for financial profit from their investment in shares of stock in the companies. They planned, also, not merely trading posts in a foreign land as in India and elsewhere, but an extension and expansion of the empire of Great Britain.


text:
Q: Is it possible to "trick" PrintScreen, swap out the contents of my form with something else before capture? I have a bit of a challenge.
In an earlier version of our product, we had an error message window (last resort, unhandled exception) that showed the exception message, type, stack trace + various bits and pieces of information.
This window was printscreen-friendly, in that if the user simply did a printscreen-capture, and emailed us the screenshot, we had almost everything we needed to start diagnosing the problem.
However, the form was deemed too technical and "scary" for normal users, so it was toned down to a more friendly one, still showing the error message, but not the stack trace and some of the more gory details that I'd still like to get. In addition, the form was added the capabilities of emailing us a text file containing everything we had before + lots of other technical details as well, basically everything we need.
However, users still use PrintScreen to capture the contents of the form and email that back to us, which means I now have a less than optimal amount of information to go on.
So I was wondering. Would it be possible for me to pre-render a bitmap the same size as my form, with everything I need on it, detect that PrintScreen was hit and quickly swap out the form contents with my bitmap before capture, and then back again afterwards?
And before you say "just educate the users", yes, that's not going to work. These are not out users, they're users at our customers place, so we really cannot tell them to wisen up all that much.
Or, barring this, is there a way for me to detect PrintScreen, tell Windows to ignore it, and instead react to it, by dumping the aformentioned prerendered bitmap onto the clipboard ready for placing into an email?
The code is C# 3.0 in .NET 3.5, if it matters, but pointers for something to look at/for is good enough.
Our error-reporting window has these capabilities:

*

*Show a screenshot that was taken when the error occured (contains all the open windows of the program at the time, before the error dialog was shown)

*Show a text file containing every gory detail we can think of (but no sensitive stuff)

*Save the above two files to disk, for latter attaching to an email or whatnot by the user

*Sending the above two files to us by email, either by opening a new support case, or entering an existing support case number to add more information to it

*Ignore the problem and hope it goes away (return to app)

*Exit the application (last resort)

We still get screenshots from some users. Not all, mind you, so my question is basically how I can make the PrintScreen button help us a bit more for those users that still use it.

A: One option: Put the stack trace and other scary stuff into the error screen using small, low-contrast type -- e.g. dark gray on light gray -- so that the user doesn't really even see it, but the Print Screen captures it.
But if you want to detect the PrintScreen and do your own thing, this looks like an example of what you want.

A: What about offering them a "Print Screen" button that performs these actions as well as performing the print screen?  If you're locked into this method of having your customers send error details, this may be an easier route to take.
Lifted from my comment below for easier reference (looks helpful, perhaps):
codeproject.com/KB/cs/PrintScreen.aspx

A: Wouldn't it be possible to disable the Print Screen button altogether when the error popup is active? Have it display a message along the lines of "Please use the clearly visible button in the middle of your screen to report the error" I agree it breaks expected functionality, but if your users are really that stupid, what can you do...
Alternatively, have it report errors automatically (or store the data locally, to be fetched later, if you can't send without asking for some reason), without asking the user. If you want to be able to connect print screened screenshots with detailed error data, have it send a unique ID with the data that's also displayed in the corner of the popup.

A: This is in theory...the best way to deal with it I would think

*

*Intercept a WM_PRINT message or inject one into your process... see this article here

*Install a system-wide keyboard hook and intercept the print-screen key and swap it around with your contents prior to the capture. Now, I can point you to several places for this, here on CodeProject, and here also, keyboard spy, and finally, global Mouse and keyboard hook on CodeProject.

Now, once you intercept the print screen, invoke the WM_PRINT message by capturing the contents that you want to capture.
I know this is brief and short, but I hope this should get you going.

A: The only solution i came up with was to offer big, large, easy to read toolbar buttons that give the user every opportunity to save the contents of the error dialog:

*

*Save

*Copy to clipboard

*Send using e-mail

*Print
And after all that, i use the Windows function SetWindowDisplayAffinity in order to show the user a black box where the form should be:

This function and GetWindowDisplayAffinity are designed to support the window content protection feature that is new to Windows 7. This feature enables applications to protect their own onscreen window content from being captured or copied through a specific set of public operating system features and APIs. However, it works only when the Desktop Window Manager(DWM) is composing the desktop.
It is important to note that unlike a security feature or an implementation of Digital Rights Management (DRM), there is no guarantee that using SetWindowDisplayAffinity and GetWindowDisplayAffinity, and other necessary functions such as DwmIsCompositionEnabled, will strictly protect windowed content, for example where someone takes a photograph of the screen.

If their screenshots show a big black box, hopefully they'll get the hint.
I did add a defeat, if they hold down shift while clicking "show error details", i don't add the protection during form construction:
//Code released into public domain. No attribution required.
if (!IsShiftKeyPressed())
   SetWindowDisplayAffinity(this.Handle, WDA_MONITOR); //Please don't screenshot the form, please e-mail me the contents!

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


The natural beef business is founded on the idea of providing food products that are an alternative to commonplace and are inherently high quality. A brand that is built on trust of the company and its suppliers to produce food products using specified raising practices that measure up to what the consumer desires and believes to be best for family and planet.
By understanding our customers we will lead in the profitable marketing of natural and organic products using ecologically focused principles.


text:
Ballet Dads Raise the Barre in Dance Class
By Aleanna Siacon
What if, when you were a child, your dad donned a tutu and danced his way through your ballet class? It would be quite the memory for you, right?
Well, recently some dads in Philadelphia did just that – and their fantastic videos went viral after the folks at the Philadelphia Dance Center posted two of these videos from their Valentine's Day father-daughter ballet class on their Facebook page, Babble reports.
Each clip is only about 30 seconds long, but together, they've amassed millions of views. For their part, the men approached ballet with gusto. They donned tutus while leaping across the floor to "The Waltz of Flowers" from The Nutcracker, right alongside their girls.
Check the videos out for yourself.
Viewers raved over the silliness of the adorable footage in the comment section on Facebook.
The videos also struck up a conversation about gender roles and parenting, and it was really heartening to see dads doing something that is traditionally considered girly. It broke the mold while putting a smile on people's faces.
A few even recalled wishing their own dads had stepped up to enjoy the "girly" things liked with them.
For instance, commenter Chris Mitchell shared her appreciation for her mom who always showed up to help and see her figure skate, but after seeing these ballet dads, she wishes her dad would have tried some twirls on the ice with her.
"This is simply amazing! I just want to say a huge think you to the dads in this video that took the time to want to be your kids and share the love they have for dance. I sometimes think of what it would have been like for my dad to come be there for me as I figure skated, but he was never there. When I see videos such as this, it makes my heart melt and brings a great joy to my life," Mitchell wrote on Facebook.
Commenter Jamie Pettyjohn also reflected on how incredibly limiting it is when dads avoid activities that are traditionally considered feminine.
"At least these fathers are involved in their children's interest," she wrote. "Sometimes it's hard on social stigmas for fathers to dance or play dolls or play dress up with their daughters, but it means the world to the daughters. I am thankful my single father swallowed his manly pride and played dolls with me when I was younger. It's not embarrassing to interact with your children."
For me, watching these dads also happened to strike a chord.
There was time when I was very little and my mom was the sole wage earner in our household. My dad didn't have a job so she worked long hours to compensate. Back then it was just my dad and I a lot of the time, and to say he made the most of it would be an understatement.
My dad would bring cookies to my school and then spend the day making copies as my teacher's assistant. He would attend Girl Scout meetings, take me to swim lessons and karate classes after school, and on the weekends, he would help me pull my hair up into a tight knot for ballet.
At dance recitals, he was the one who sprayed glitter on me and made sure the wings on my butterfly costume weren't lopsided.
It never appeared as if my dad cared much that he was usually the only guy in a gaggle of dance moms, and that may have been one of the most important things in the world he could have done for me – because looking back, I understand that my dad took care of me and spent time with me without condition.
I don't think I really thought of him as a boy doing girly things. I saw this as my dad having fun with me, and maybe partly because of that, I've always struggled with this social notion that certain things are either for boys or for girls and it's somehow weird/wrong when that manufactured equilibrium is challenged.
And if you ask me, I'm glad that's something I take issue with – because opportunities don't seem too far off and goals don't seem impossible to me on the basis of my gender.
In the words of commenter Kasey Endsley:
"This is the sweetest thing ever! Thank you dads who support their children!! Thank you dads who will wear tutus for their children and not think twice about how it could be 'confusing and wrong'!!! Thank you to dads who play along and love their kids and allow them to grow into their own people."
Your Overnight Camp Survival Kit
Here are some extras to consider for first-time overnight campers.
Choco Town: An Immersive Journey Into a Sweet Town Makes Its Way To Metro Detroit
Calling all chocolate lovers! Head to Oakland Mall for a day full of selfies and sweets.
Questions to Ask Before Sending Kids to Camp
It's time to start thinking about summer camps.
Where to Play Indoor Mini Golf in Metro Detroit and Ann Arbor
Take your family to play putt-putt at one of these unique indoor spots.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


The Ark 8m x 4mm 7x7 Strand Wire Cable and 4 Cable Clamp Kit is all you need to replace your existing, broken or worn brake cable. The importance of having working and reliable brakes is crucial to ensure safety. Good quality brakes and cabling should be checked regularly, and knowing it's all up to scratch means less time worrying.


God responds to prayers of nurses for a professional nurses group in and around Grand Junction, Colorado.
A nurse's personal experience with trauma amplifies her understanding of Jesus' suffering for us in this Easter devotional.
A faith community nurse in Ukraine relates how enabling patients to die with dignity is a new concept in this former Soviet republic.
Does your spiritual life need some refreshing? Spiritual dehydration can come on subtly—and the results can be dire.
Students in the NCF group at the University of Missouri have built healthy connections to each other and to God.
Nurses can address and implement change that positively impacts the health and lives of those around us.
How can we believe that real joy and gladness will overtake the brokenness and death we encounter?
Spiritual life is growing and spreading on the Burlington Campus of Rowan College in New Jersey—and prayer is powering it.
Six new Bible studies have been added to the Follow Jesus in Nursing series which is available for free.
How can nurses run fast enough to keep their footing on the rapid treadmill of digital skills and healthcare knowledge?


text:
Q: Add sorting by bounty size to new navigation The new nav has a special 'sort' option now. Can we have a 'bounty amount' added to these options? Please?
So it would look like this:

Note: This question is asking for the same thing, but with the new nav, this should be incredibly easy to add!!


"Toward Sustainable Adoption of Technologies for Human Development in S" by Philip F. Musa, Peter Meso et al.
This paper proposes and merges an extension of technology acceptance model with ideas from human development research targeting least developed countries. Specifically, the paper proposes an extension of the influence of perceived user resource, which in turn was developed from the original TAM literature. It is also tied to the Information Technology literature about socio-economic development. Our objective is to shed light on the interactions between socio-economic development needs and factors generally innate to sub-Sahara Africa and other developing countries that impede sustainable technological adoption and diffusion. We argue that developing countries lag in adopting 'foreign technologies'. We offer diagnostics and prescriptions for how to effect a sustainable technological adoption to support socio-economic development across Sub-Saharan Africa. This article should bring into focus this and other developing regions that are almost non-existent in mainstream information systems research.


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The name was suggested by a friend of the band who had stacks of the magazine lying around.
Art in America's self-titled 1983 record. Courtesy Art in America.
You never know what you're going to find when record shopping in Poughkeepsie, New York. Flipping through the vinyl at Darkside Records recently, I stumbled across a 1983 LP by Detroit band Art in America. Yes, the very same name as the century-old art magazine.
The band's music engages in some of the aesthetic of contemporaneous prog rock bands like Yes, but focuses on radio-ready, three-minute pop tunes. The cover of the self-titled LP, released on CBS/Epic-Pavillion Records, features a dreamy, lush green landscape superimposed with a number of floating blue orbs, with the band's name inscribed in red in the sky. The image is the first record cover by the Greek-born, single-named artist Ioannis, who later designed covers for bands like Deep Purple, the Allman Brothers, and King Crimson.
Active in the Detroit music scene in the late 1970s and early '80s, Art in America consisted of three siblings from Michigan—lead singer and guitarist Chris Ruetenik, drummer Dan Ruetenik, and harpist Shishonee Ruetenik—along with bassist Jim Kuha. To burnish their image, the Rueteniks eventually became the Flynns, a punchier stage name for the first American rock band to employ a concert-size Lyon & Healey pedal harp.
Photo courtesy of Art in America.
But how did an art magazine come to be the namesake of a Detroit rock band?
Rick Smith, the band's manager in the '80s and now principal of Michigan's Wild Justice Music, says he cleared the use of the name with the magazine's then editor-in-chief, Elizabeth C. Baker. "Let's rock and roll," Smith says she told him. Baker, reached by phone, didn't recall the conversation and pointed out that such requests would normally go through the publishers. Neither Whitney Communications Corporation, which owned the magazine at the time, or Sony, which now owns Columbia, responded to emails.
The magazine's name inspired the album's title track as well as its rousing chorus: "Art in America / it's different in my eyes / so welcome to new times / I know that you're tired." After a harp introduction, the video, which aired on MTV, shows the band performing the tune while floating in space; images of band members climbing stairs and opening doors symbolize the revelation of a new aesthetic.
"I was a bit full of myself in those days," says Ruetenik. "It's kind of embarrassing to look back on that. We were going to save everyone from music they were tired of and give people something new and incredible." The band did have some success, getting a fair amount of radio play and opening for some of the major acts of the day, like Bill Bruford, Adam and the Ants, and King Crimson, but never hit it big. The band members dispersed, found jobs, and got on with their lives.
But the story doesn't end there. Ruetenik got a call at his cubicle at work several years ago from English recording engineer David Hentschel, who has worked with artists from George Harrison to Queen. When Hentschel asked if they were still active, Ruetenik didn't hesitate: "I lied through my teeth," he told Michigan Radio in a 2013 interview. The band, which hadn't played together in years, recorded several new songs under Hentschel's tutelage. They had a real Rip Van Winkle experience, having gone silent in the classic radio age and revived in the era of streaming services.


text:
Q: Case Else in PowerShell I'm converting VBScript to PowerShell and I have an issue with Select Case. I'm trying to find a way to do a Case Else.
switch($IncomingText.SubString(0,1)) {
    "1" {
        switch($IncomingText.SubString(12,3)) {
            "601" {
                $TempString = ($IncomingText.SubString(0,75))

                if (RemoveSpaces($IncomingText.SubString(75,10)) = True) {
                    $TempString = $TempString + (StrReverse($IncomingText.SubString(75,10))) + ($IncomingText.SubString(85,10))
                } else {
                    $TempString = $TempString + ($IncomingText.SubString(75,20))
                }
                return $TempString

                Case Else
                if (RemoveSpaces($IncomingText.SubString(155,10)) = True) {
                    $TempString = $TempString + (StrReverse($IncomingText.SubString(155,10))) + ($IncomingText.SubString(165))
                } else {
                    $TempString = $TempString + ($IncomingText.SubString(155))
                }
                return $TempString
            }
        }
    }
}

In VBScript there's this Case Else. I want to stay in the "601" and proceed with the next section. How do I do it in PowerShell? Since Case Else doesn't seems to be working for me.

A: Taken from Windows Powershell site
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff730937.aspx
So use default instead of case else.
$a = 5
switch ($a)
{
    1 {"The color is red."}
    2 {"The color is blue."}
    3 {"The color is green."}
    4 {"The color is yellow."}
    5 {"The color is orange."}
    6 {"The color is purple."}
    7 {"The color is pink."}
    8 {"The color is brown."}
    default {"The color could not be determined."}
}

A: You're looking for default:
Switch ($something) {
   1 { .. }
   2 { .. }
   default { .. }
}

A: I'd like to point out that the Switch command will evaluate scriptblocks similar to an If statement, so you could just create more complex cases:
switch($IncomingText) {
    {$_.SubString(0,1) -eq '1' -and $IncomingText.SubString(12,3) -eq '601'}
                {
                    $TempString = $IncomingText.SubString(0,75)

                    if (![string]::IsNullOrWhiteSpace($IncomingText.SubString(75,10))) {
                        $TempString = $TempString + (StrReverse($IncomingText.SubString(75,10))) + ($IncomingText.SubString(85,10))
                    } else {
                        $TempString = $TempString + ($IncomingText.SubString(75,20))
                    }
                }

     default
                {
                    if (RemoveSpaces($IncomingText.SubString(155,10)) = True) {
                        $TempString = $TempString + (StrReverse($IncomingText.SubString(155,10))) + ($IncomingText.SubString(165))
                    } else {
                        $TempString = $TempString + ($IncomingText.SubString(155))
                    }
                    return $TempString
                }
}

I would also like to note that it looks like you are removing spaces from a 10 character string, and testing to see if anything is left. If there is you reverse those 10 characters, then add the next 10 characters, if not you simply add all 20 characters as they are. My point is that if the first 10 characters are all spaces then reversing them is harmless, so you may as well just always reverse them. With that in mind your code gets a lot simpler:
Function StrReverse ($MyString){
    $arrMyString = $MyString.ToCharArray()
    [array]::Reverse($arrMyString)
    $arrMyString -join ''
}

switch($IncomingText) {
    {$_.SubString(0,1) -eq '1' -and $IncomingText.SubString(12,3) -eq '601'}
                {
                    $TempString = $IncomingText.SubString(0,75) + (StrReverse $IncomingText.SubString(75,10)) + $IncomingText.SubString(85,10)
                }

     default
                {
                    $TempString + (StrReverse $IncomingText.SubString(155,10)) + $IncomingText.SubString(165)
                }
}


Maybury Mansions Condo in Fort Lauderdale is really a wonderful location. The Fort Lauderdale location is amazing. But, if this isn't the community for you, you might like one of the other local communities like North Ridge or Las Olas Beach Club or La Cascade that are located here as well.


text:
European Commission threatens to sanction Poland, strip voting rights over far-right judicial reforms [Image: REUTERS/Kacper Pempel]
European Commission threatens to sanction Poland, strip voting rights over far-right judicial reforms
Published on December 20, 2017 December 21, 2017 by Lima Charlie
The European Commission moved Wednesday to trigger Article 7 of the Treaty on European Union, a process which strips EU voting rights from member countries that violate the EU's core values. Core or "common" values inherent in the treaty are found in Article 2 and include, "respect for human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law and respect for human rights."
The EU's main issue with Poland is a series of legal reforms which are said to strip power from the country's judiciary and put more power into the executive.
Thousands of anti-government demonstrators gather in front of Poland's Supreme Court, July 16, 2017 [Image: Czarek Sokołowski/AP]
The Commission issued a statement that read, "Despite repeated efforts, for almost two years, to engage the Polish authorities in a constructive dialogue … the Commission has today concluded that there is a clear risk of a serious breach of the rule of law in Poland." The statement clarified that by triggering Article 7(1), "The European Commission is taking action to protect the rule of law in Europe," and that "[j]udicial reforms in Poland mean that the country's judiciary is now under the political control of the ruling majority." The EU statement concludes that "[i]n the absence of judicial independence, serious questions are raised about the effective application of EU law …".
Despite efforts for a constructive dialogue for 2 years, we have concluded that there is a clear risk of a serious breach of the rule of law in #Poland
We therefore proposed to @EUCouncil to adopt a decision under #Article7 (1) of the Treaty on EU
https://t.co/EFfnjTOlF6
— European Commission (@EU_Commission) December 20, 2017
"The facts leave us no choice," said Commission Vice President, Frans Timmermans. The 28 member EU has never triggered Article 7, established over 17 years ago, which is often referred to as the "nuclear option." The Commission tweeted today, "It is with a heavy heart that we have concluded that there is a clear risk of a serious breach of the rule of law."
During the last two years, more than 13 laws affecting the entire structure of the justice system were adopted in #Poland.
It is with a heavy heart that we have concluded that there is a clear risk of a serious breach of the rule of law.https://t.co/EFfnjTOlF6 #Article7 pic.twitter.com/GHSyg6HWlM
Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki responded to the news on twitter:
Poland is as devoted to the rule of law as the rest of the EU. Current judiciary reform is deeply needed. The dialogue between the Commission and Warsaw needs to be both open and honest. I believe that Poland's sovereignty and the idea of United Europe can be reconciled.
— Mateusz Morawiecki (@MorawieckiM) December 20, 2017
On Dec. 1, Poland's Law and Justice (PiS) party, passed legislation enabling the government to remove 40% of the judges on Poland's Supreme Court by lowering the retirement age of judges from 70 to 65 years. The decision on which judges over 65 could remain will reside with Polish President Andrzej Duda. The legislation also reduces the threshold for the appointment of new judges from three fifths of the Parliament to a simple majority. The resulting vacancies would then likely be filled by PiS, a far-right, national-conservative, and Christian democratic political party, that currently enjoys a comfortable majority in the Polish Parliament.
Under the new laws the Supreme Court, with the support of the prosecutor-general, who is also the justice minister, will now be able to conduct an "extraordinary appeal" and reopen final judgments by lower courts, including any case adjudicated since Poland's present constitution was adopted in 1997 .
In November, a group of 28 NGOs warned, "the introduction of these amendments will mean that Poland will definitively cease to be a democratic state of law. If independent general courts cease to exist, nothing will stand in the way of restricting the civic rights and duties written into the Constitution in the future without having a sufficient majority."
PiS maintains that these legal reforms are necessary, stipulating that Polish courts are saturated with judges left over from Poland's Communist era. However, the opposition party, Civic Platform, alleges that the far-right government is attempting to place loyalists inside the country's courts and judiciary councils.
The EU has contended that by the actions of PiS, "the executive and legislative branches have been systematically enabled to politically interfere in the composition, powers, administration and functioning of the judicial branch."
"We do not dispute the right of a government, a nation, to reform its judiciary," Timmermans said to reporters in Brussels. "But if you reform the judiciary you need to abide by your own constitution and EU law."
During last 2 years, >13 laws affecting the entire structure of the justice system were adopted in #Poland.
Executive & legislative branches have been systematically enabled to politically interfere in the judicial branch.
Read more: https://t.co/EFfnjTOlF6 #article7
This is not the first time Poland has antagonized Brussels in 2017 either. In May, Polish Prime Minister Beata Szydlo announced that the country would no longer accept refugees from overcrowded camps in Greece and Italy, which all other EU states–Hungary excluded–have committed to.
Even after Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron announced last week that they support removing EU voting rights from Poland, it is still unlikely that Poland's vote with actually be taken away. In order for voting rights to be removed, the European Commission must unanimously agree to it. That proves a difficult task, as Hungary has already vowed to vote against the measure, and the Czech Republic shares Poland's stance against accepting refugees.
However, Article 7 is not France and Germany's only option. Debate is now underway for the 2018 EU budget, and because Britain–the 2nd wealthiest country in Europe–is expected to withdraw from the EU in 2019, substantial cuts are anticipated.
Over the past year, EU Budget Commissioner Günther Oettinger has been outlining plans for tougher "conditionality" for structural funds. Currently, the European Union has plans to distribute over $500 billion by 2020 in structural funds, which are to be invested into less developed areas of Europe. Poland's GDP is $470 billion. Conditionality would tie these distributions to the implementation of certain reforms.
PiS's political situation inside of Poland is unlikely to be seriously impacted by the EU move. According to polling, PiS is the second most popular party amongst voters in all of Europe (Fidesz, the nationalist party which governs Hungary, is first).
Poland's National Independence Day marchers. (Photo via Reddit)
The popularity of PiS's right-wing policies in Poland is reflected in the country's larger culture. For decades, the National Independence Day marches, which take place in November, have been marred by violent confrontations between police and right-wing protestors. However, for the last two years the marches have been largely peaceful, suggesting that solidarity is growing amongst Poles.
LIMA CHARLIE NEWS, with Diego Lynch
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UK backs Poland over European Union sanction
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Four South Sydney Rabbitohs women's stars have been selected to play for NSW Country in the inaugural Women's National Championships, at Owen Park, Southport between June 1-3.
The Women's National Championships will feature NSW Country, NSW City, Queensland Country, Queensland City, Affiliated States and the Australian Defence Force; with all sides to play three games each across the tournament.
Country Rugby League CEO Terry Quinn believes the Women's National Championship provides a great opportunity for female players from Regional NSW to test themselves against the best players in Australia.
"We are extremely proud to be a part of the inaugural Women's National Championship and we're excited to see the best players from Country NSW competing on a national stage," said Quinn.
"The women's game continues to grow in all areas of Country Rugby League and having seven current Jillaroos in our squad is testament to the quality of players coming from Regional NSW.
"There have been some great announcements made for the women's game in recent times and we fully support the continual development of pathways for female players.
"I want to wish our team the best of luck in the National Championships and wish them all the best in gaining selection for New South Wales and the Jillaroos in the future."
The NRL will also host a Talent ID day on May 31 at Runaway Bay Rugby League Football Club, in partnership with Griffith University and prior to the Championship.
The ID day will provide an opportunity for current female rugby league players, together with female athletes from across sporting codes, to test themselves across a range of rugby league skills and drills, with the chance to be involved in the 2018 Women's Premiership and beyond.
The National Championships will be live-streamed via the QRL website.


text:
Altaf Bukhari terms abolition of J&K Cadre 'unwarranted, arbitrary'
3:31 pm February 7, 2020
Terming the decision of abolition of J&K Cadre of Civil Services as unwarranted and arbitrary, former finance minister Syed Mohammad Altaf Bukhari on Friday demanded that the decision be rolled back in light of the promises of the restoration of Statehood made by the Country's Prime Minister on the floor of Parliament.
Bukhari also expressed strong reservations on doing away with five years age relaxation granted to Jammu and Kashmir youth in the Civil Services examinations. "The decision of abolition of J&K Cadre and doing away with the five years age relaxation are capricious and have come as a shocker for the people of Jammu and Kashmir especially its aspirants for Civil Services careers," Bukhari remarked.
The former finance minister observed that these decisions are confusing and make no sense because at the time of temporary conversion of J&K from State to Union Territory, the Central Government had assured there will be no fiddling with the J&K Cadre.
"These decisions seem to have been taken without proper application of mind. Not only the sanctity of Caderization of Civil Services has been put to a question mark but the decision to abolish J&K Cadre will be a strong factor for demotivation of J&K youth who aspire to join the prestigious civil services in the country," he opined.
Bukhari observed that the five years age relaxation was granted by the government of India to J&K civil service aspirants because of topography, inclement climatic conditions and the hostile security scenario in Kashmir Valley.
"However, the contenders from all the regions of Jammu and Kashmir were equally benefitted by this special provision of age relaxation. Doing away with this advantage has not only brought cynicism among them but has also disillusioned thousands of J&K students who have gone outside State for coaching, thereby wasting their precious time and resources," he added.
The former finance minister demanded an immediate review of these decisions in the larger interests of people of Jammu and Kashmir especially its huge number of qualified, unemployed youth.
"The status of Jammu and Kashmir may have changed from a State to Union territory but unfortunately there is no marked change on the ground situation sofar. These hostile decisions are bound to alienate our aspiring youth further," Bukhari observed, while appealing the Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister to intervene into the matter and ask the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) to revoke its decisions without any delay.
He said that the civil service aspirants of Jammu and Kashmir appear in the examination conducted through UPSC after facing tremendous hardships including inclement weather, intimidating security situation and frequent internet shutdowns. "Our youth have always braved all odds with a hope that they will get a chance to prove their mettle in the prestigious civil service examinations. That hope, trust and confidence of our students need to be restored by the leadership of our country," he advocated.
Syed Mohammad Altaf Bukhari
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In a year where Brisbane has faced some of it's most challenging of times, working on a positive campaign promoting the city and encouraging people to make it a better place was a great experience. I shot a range of images from all around Brisbane for the Together Brisbane project, which can now be seen around the city on Billboards, buses, bus stops and the Together Brisbane website among other places. Now, with the Brisbane Festival coming up, user submitted images are being rolled out throughout the city. I can't be more excited about the use of photography to tell the stories of the people of Brisbane, something I've been focused on through my own project, The BNE Project. Many thanks to the great team from Big Fish who I worked with on the campaign and to David Byrne who photographed the above image.
Please excuse quality of the iphone shots… "The best camera is the one on you." right?
Perhaps it's a few days late, but here are some images from my top 10 shoots of 2010! It was an incredible year.
I head back to Tokyo once or twice a year and most often in the winter time. At this time of the year, the Momiji leaves (Japanese maple) dominate the treeline and cover the ground in parks. I really love the way these leaves look against a nice bokeh.
I traveled to New York, Boston and Los Angeles earlier in the year where I met some of the most inspiring and creative people and took part in Phoot Camp, where I shot this portrait.
To be able to shoot for Michael Hill's catalog was a great experience. Working against an impressive existing collection, I learnt a few new tricks of the trade when it comes to this type of product photography. It's probably some of the best product work I've done to date.
Modeled after the US based annual TED conferences, TEDxBrisbane was an Independently organised TED event. The day included talks from a diverse range of prolific thinkers and doers. I shot all the TEDx events held in Brisbane in 2010 and have been truly inspired by them all.
I worked on an image library for Green Heart, an environmental sustainability program in Brisbane, with the focus on creating carbon-neutral city by 2026. It was great to work with and meet so many inspiring people dedicated to building a better and greener city to live in.
It was a busy time for me in January. I had just come back from a freezing winter in Tokyo, returning to spend a few hot days in a Brisbane summer. Before I had a chance to settle back in, I was off to shoot a wedding in an uncomfortably humid Philippines. With all the travel, changes in climate, and stress of working in a new environment, just watching the warm rain roll in took me to my happy place. With good music playing on my headphones, a big wedding shoot behind me, and big drops of warm rain splashing off my feet, it was the perfect way to unwind and enjoy the rest of my stay.
I had the pleasure of working on an exhilarating and colourful editorial shoot for Tiger Airways, which had me following biker Mac Swift around the Tweed Valley in Northern New South Wales. I was asked to capture the journey along some of the Valley's beautiful rain-forests and beaches, which eventually led me to dangerously balancing on the back of a moving Harley, trying to get the cover shot! Definitely one of the most thrilling shoots of the year.
2010 was a big year for film and creative work for me. With a new Hasselblad, I continued work on my film project, Von Vintage. The site is soon to be relaunched and will also be selling prints! Keep an eye out!
I'd have to say that my most used camera (other than my SLR) has to be the 360 spinner from Lomography. It's a camera that literally spins 360 degrees (or more) in your hand, exposing a long strip of 35mm film, including the sprocket holes! I was in Melbourne, shooting the Finders Keepers Markets when I found this puddle. You can also see some other shots of mine on the PHOTOJOJO website!
I worked with former Reds rugby player, Charlie Fetoai and the team at Fadez Men's Barbershops for a pitch they were putting together for MTV. This isn't one of the images used, but I found the antics and outtakes to be some of the funnest.
It was a busy busy year, and there were quite a few other shoots that I wish I could have included in this list! Coming in close, but not making it into my top 10 were : My shoot with Scott Spark, Help Portrait, the BNE project shoot with John Davis and working on the One Punch Can Kill Campaign!
Following a few busy months since my last BNE project shoot, I met up with John Davis a guitar repairer based up in Red Hill in Brisbane. For those unfamiliar with the project, every person selected for the BNE project is chosen by a previous BNE participant. John Davis was selected as the inspiration of one of my early BNE portraits, Dan from Dan and Dilmah.
I caught up with John a few days before the shoot at his store and spent a few hours chatting and observing, amongst a constant influx of passionate guitar lovers frequenting the store. One of the things I noticed about John is that when he was working, he was constantly in motion. Whether it was chatting to three customers at once or restringing a guitar, the man is always on the move! I came back a few days later and despite having scheduled the shoot after hours to avoid interruptions, John was still juggling customers and fixing guitars into the night. This passion for his work, people, and guitars is something I really wanted to capture with this shoot.
Earlier in the year, as part of my BNE Project, I did a shoot with Joshua Levi (Brisbane photographer, gallery owner, entrepreneur), while he was working on the construction of a second new gallery. I had always intended on doing the second portrait for the series back in the same space once it had been finished, but also really wanted to somehow incorporate more of Josh as well as his trademark bathtub at his main gallery. Residing mainly at Joshua Levi Galleries in Woolloongabba, the vintage clawfoot tub had been used in helping to promote his past shows as well as in his latest combined photographic exhibition "Coke Can Spirituality" where it even found itself on the back of a ute in front of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's electoral office.
Like most of my shoots, we threw around a couple of ideas and tried out a few different approaches before deciding how we wanted in the shot to look and everything to work. After rehanging and rearranging all of Josh's own "bathtub" photography a few times and having to refill the tub (and clean up) after a few explosive splashes, we finally ended up with what we wanted.
Pecha Kucha Night – Volume 10 was held as part of the Brisbane Ideas Festival on the 27th of March. I had the opportunity to present at the event and speak about some of my work and projects.
Pecha Kucha is an event where any designer, artist, architect, interactive media or alike, are given the soapbox to present their designs, thoughts and ideas. Each presenter gets 20 seconds to showcase and talk about 20 slides of their work.
This is a video of my presentation. Lots of "umms", I know, but with a packed crowd of 300 in the room, 200 on the 2nd floor balcony, and another few hundred on the ground floor watching the live feed, I was pretty nervous!
I was recently interviewed and featured on a great website called Australian Edge – "Showcasing Australian Creativity". You can have a read of the interview here.
I love sites like this and it features some great work, make sure you check them out!
Australian Edge is a collective helping promote Australian creativity in all forms. Australia has an exciting and vibrant creative scene. Australian designers, artists and industry professionals through their contributions have had a strong influence locally as well as globally in their related fields.
In the coming weeks I will be exhibiting a number of my portraits at the Brisbane Powerhouse. They will be exhibited as part of 'photosXfour', a collaboration of four Brisbane Photographers and four unique commercial styles. Over 40 images are on show, and cover genres from editoiral style fashion to urban landscapes. Hope to see you there!!!
For more information or details on opening night please feel free to contact me.
BNE Exhibition at Urban Grind – NEW LOCATION!
The BNE exhibition has moved to Urban Grind in New Farm and will be showing there until 17th May 2008. The layout of the new shop is great. Make sure you stop in there for a coffee!
I am holding an exhibition at Urban Grind in Paddington from the 20th of April – 3rd of May. The exhibition features both recent and unseen portraits of BNE (Brisbane). So head over to Urban Grind, have a coffee and check out my stuff!!!


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50 Inspirational Presidential Quotes
"It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed." — Theodore Roosevelt. Here are 50 Inspirational Presidential Quotes.
Presidential Quotes
1. "On matters of style, swim with the current, on matters of principle, stand like a rock." — Thomas Jefferson
2. "The advancement and diffusion of knowledge is the only guardian of true liberty." — James Madison
3. "If tyranny and oppression come to this land it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy." — James Madison
4. "A little flattery will support a man through great fatigue" — James Monroe
5. "Courage and perseverance have a magical talisman, before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish into air." — John Quincy Adams
6. "Try and fail, but don't fail to try." — John Quincy Adams
7. "One man with courage makes a majority." — Andrew Jackson
8. "It's easier to do a job right, than to explain why you didn't." — Martin Van Buren
9. "There is nothing more corrupting, nothing more destructive of the noblest and finest feelings of our nature, than the exercise of unlimited power." — William Henry
10. "It is not strange… to mistake change for progress" — Millard Fillmore
11. "You don't know what you can miss before you try." — Franklin Pierce
12. "I am a slow walker, but I never walk backwards." — Abraham Lincoln
13. "There are men and women who make the world better just by being the kind of people they are. They have the gift of kindness or courage or loyalty or integrity. It really matters very little whether they are behind the wheel of a truck or running a business or bringing up a family. They teach the truth by living it." — James Garfield
14. "It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed." — Theodore Roosevelt
15. "Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power." — Abraham Lincoln
16. "If wrinkles must be written on our brow, let them not be written on our heart. The spirit should never grow old." — James Garfield
17. "Be patient and calm; no one can catch a fish with anger." — Herbert Hoover
18."What counts is not necessarily the size of the dog in the fight- it's the size of the fight in the dog." — Dwight D. Eisenhower
19. "Words without actions are the assassins of idealism." — Herbert Hoover
20. "It's amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit."— Harry S. Truman
21. "The Chinese use two brush strokes to write the word 'crisis.' One brush stroke stands for danger; the other for opportunity. In a crisis, be aware of the danger–but recognize the opportunity." — John F. Kennedy
22. "Never waste a minute thinking about people you don't like." — Dwight D. Eisenhower
23. "Conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of growth" — John F. Kennedy
24. "We become not a melting pot but a beautiful mosaic. Different people, different beliefs, different yearnings, different hopes, different dreams." — Jimmy Carter
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25. "Live simply, love generously, care deeply, speak kindly, leave the rest to God."— Ronald Reagan
26. "I have opinions of my own – strong opinions – but I don't always agree with them." — George H.W. Bush
27. "We all do better when we work together. Our differences do matter, but our common humanity matters more." — Bill Clinton
28. "There's an old saying in Tennessee — I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can't get fooled again." — George W. Bush
29. "If you're walking down the right path and you're willing to keep walking, eventually you'll make progress." — Barack Obama
30. "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." — Thomas Jefferson
31. "Let us not seek the Republican answer or the Democratic answer, but the right answer. Let us not seek to fix the blame for the past. Let us accept our own responsibility for the future." — John F. Kennedy
32. "When you reach the end of your rope, tie a knot in it and hang on." — Franklin D. Roosevelt
33. "Do what you can, with what you have, where you are." — Theodore Roosevelt
34. "It is far better to be alone, than to be in bad company." — George Washington
35. "Motivation is the art of getting people to do what you want them to do because they want to do it." — Dwight D. Eisenhower
36. "It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit." — Harry S Truman
37. "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." — John Adams
38. "No dream is too big. No challenge is too great. Nothing we want for our future is beyond our reach." — Donald Trump
39. "Yesterday is not ours to recover, but tomorrow is ours to win or lose." — Lyndon B. Johnson
40. "If men were angels, no government would be necessary." — James Madison
41. "Yes We Can!" ― Barack Obama
42. "I can take it. The tougher it gets, the cooler I get." — Richard M. Nixon
43. "Older men declare war. But it is the youth that must fight and die." — Herbert Hoover
44. "A government big enough to give you everything you want is a government big enough to take from you everything you have." — Gerald R. Ford
45. "Always vote for principle, though you may vote alone, and you may cherish the sweetest reflection that your vote is never lost." — John Quincy Adams
46. "The best form of government is that which is most likely to prevent the greatest sum of evil." — James Monroe
47. "Don't write so that you can be understood, write so that you can't be misunderstood." — William Howard Taft
48. "The ballot box is the surest arbiter of disputes among free men." — James Buchanan
49. "America's present need is not heroics but healing; not nostrums but normalcy; not revolution but restoration." — Warren G. Harding
50. "Honor lies in honest toil" — Grover Clevelandd
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You Will Like These
If you enjoyed these quotes, here are some other quotes and articles that are sure to help improve your life.
- 32 Motivational Eleanor Roosevelt Quotes
- 30 Best New Decade Quotes To Start The Year Right
- 7 Ways to Surround Yourself With People Who Want to Be Great
Best of Presidential Quotes
"No dream is too big. No challenge is too great. Nothing we want for our future is beyond our reach." — Donald Trump
"Yes We Can!" ― Barack Obama
"It is far better to be alone, than to be in bad company." — George Washington
46 Inspirational Neil Gaiman Quotes
Wall Street Wednesday – INDEX Defined
Wall Street Wednesday – Account Statement Defined
Wall Street Wednesday – Acquisition Defined


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COVID-19, MIS-C and Kawasaki Disease Share Underlying Molecular Patterns and Immune Response
TOPICS:COVID-19ImmunologyInfectious DiseasesInflammationPediatricsUCSD
By University of California, San Diego May 16, 2022
UC San Diego researchers summarize the similarities and differences between COVID-19, MIS-C and Kawasaki disease, three conditions unified by the same immune-associated gene signature. Credit: UC San Diego Health Sciences
The inflammatory disorders share similar underlying molecular patterns, a University of California San Diego (UCSD) study reports; findings may improve disease diagnosis and treatment and support new drug targets for MIS-C.
When COVID-19 emerged and doctors raced to define and treat the new disease, they soon discovered it was not the only novel illness caused by SARS-CoV-2. A subset of children infected by the virus also experienced abdominal pain, headaches, rashes, and vomiting. This new set of symptoms was labeled multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C) and had many of its pediatric patients requiring intensive care.
As the prevalence of MIS-C increased, physicians began to note its similarities to a pre-pandemic illness, Kawasaki disease (KD), which has baffled pediatricians for more than 50 years. MIS-C and KD share many symptoms, including fever, rash, and bloodshot eyes, though KD can also lead to coronary artery aneurysms and heart attacks. Unlike MIS-C, which is associated with a specific virus, KD may be triggered by a variety of infectious and environmental stimuli.
To better understand how these inflammatory syndromes compare and contrast, researchers at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine collected blood and tissue samples from MIS-C and KD patients. Using artificial intelligence tools, they analyzed patterns of gene expression in both conditions and compared them to gene expression markers of COVID-19.
This study was led by UC San Diego School of Medicine researchers Pradipta Ghosh, MD, (left), Jane C. Burns, MD, (center) and Debashis Sahoo, PhD (right). Credit: UC San Diego Health Sciences
The findings, which will be published today (May 16, 2022) in the journal Nature Communications, reveal that MIS-C and KD are on the same immune response continuum as COVID-19, with MIS-C being a more severe version of the response than KD. Despite these underlying similarities, the conditions do diverge in several laboratory and clinical parameters. Authors said the findings could improve disease diagnosis, monitoring, and treatment in pediatric patients.
"We want our immune system to protect us from harmful stimuli, but some children are genetically predisposed to respond more intensely, leading to inflammation and unwanted symptoms across the body," said co-corresponding author Jane C. Burns, MD, a pediatrician at Rady Children's Hospital-San Diego and director of the Kawasaki Disease Research Center at UC San Diego School of Medicine. "The sooner we can identify and understand the child's inflammatory condition, the better we can tailor our delivery of life-saving support."
The research team previously identified a set of 166 genes expressed in viral respiratory diseases, including COVID-19, a subset of which also corresponded to disease severity. Researchers found that this same "gene signature" also applied to both MIS-C and KD, suggesting the conditions all stem from a similar underlying mechanism, which involves the rapid release of IL15/IL15RA cytokines.
The team then looked at a separate set of 13 genes used to identify KD, and found that a computer program trained to look for this genetic signature could not tell the KD and MIS-C samples apart.
"We were not expecting that," said co-corresponding author Pradipta Ghosh, MD, professor of medicine and cellular and molecular medicine at UC San Diego School of Medicine. "We analyzed MIS-C and KD through the lens of two distinct gene signatures, and both experiments told us these diseases are closely related."
Ghosh said the two gene signatures likely represent different parts of the same broader immune response.
While the study provides a new unifying framework for these diseases, it also identifies a few subtle differences. For example, MIS-C patients had lower blood platelet and eosinophil counts, two features that can be measured from routine blood tests. And, while many serum cytokines were similarly elevated in both conditions, a select few were more elevated in MIS-C than in KD samples.
Authors noted that therapeutics targeting some of these cytokines, including TNFa and IL1ß, have already been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and are being tested as novel treatments for MIS-C.
"We believe our findings have a high potential to impact clinical trial planning immediately, and also shape clinical guidelines and patient care down the line," said co-corresponding author Debashis Sahoo, PhD, associate professor of pediatrics and computer science at UC San Diego School of Medicine and UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering.
Reference: "An Artificial Intelligence-guided signature reveals the shared host immune response in MIS-C and Kawasaki disease" by Pradipta Ghosh, Gajanan D. Katkar, Chisato Shimizu, Jihoon Kim, Soni Khandelwal, Adriana H. Tremoulet, John T. Kanegaye and Pediatric Emergency Medicine Kawasaki Disease Research Group, 16 May 2022, Nature Communications.
DOI: 10.1038/s41467-022-30357-w
Co-authors include: Gajanan D. Katkar, Chisato Shimizu, Jihoon Kim, Soni Khandelwal, Adriana H. Tremoulet, John T. Kanegaye, Pediatric Emergency Medicine Kawasaki Disease Research Group and Soumita Das, all at UC San Diego, as well as Joseph Bocchini of the Willis-Knighton Health System.
Funding: National Institutes of Health, UCOP-RGPO, iDASH, Patient Outcomes Research Institute, Gordon and Marilyn Macklin Foundation, American Association of Immunologists Intersect Fellowship Program for Computational Scientists and Immunologists, UC San Diego Stem Cell Center
Heart Function Recovered Quickly in Children With COVID-19-Related Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome
Heart Complications in Children & Young Adults After COVID-19 Are Uncommon – But More Research Needed
Gene Therapy Gives Ovarian Cancer Patients Hope
AI Trained With Genetic Data Predicts How Patients With Viral Infections – Including COVID-19 – Will Fare
Results From World's Largest Study of Hospital Patients With COVID-19
Important Clue to Rare Inflammatory Disease Found in Children Following COVID-19 Infection
New Biomimetic Nanosponges Could Soak Up SARS-CoV-2, Treating COVID-19
Alzheimer's Disease and COVID-19 Share a Genetic Risk Factor
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Lamb begins sentence for probation violation on 2018 felony case
2018 Election Roundup with article links to each race
Barton County 2018 unofficial election results
Democrat Kelly defeats Kobach in governor's race
USD 428 sees increase in free, reduced-price lunches
GBHS Robots Club receives grant for seat belt safety program
Last month, Great Bend USD 428 Board of Education members heard that nearly 95% of the students at Eisenhower Elementary School would receive free or reduced-price lunches this fall. While the actual figure is significantly less than that, Superintendent Khris Thexton said there are more students meeting the low-income guidelines for food assistance than a year ago.
Thexton told the school board on Monday that the 94.5% figure cited last month by Eisenhower Principal JoAnn Blevins represented the percentage of students whose families had applied for free and reduced-price meals. The actual percentage of eligible students at Eisenhower is 77.34% — a 6.65% increase from the 2018-19 school year. More families participated after Great Bend USD 428 added the application to its online enrollment forms. And at Eisenhower, the school secretary pointed that option out at enrollment time.
Overall, at least 50% of the students at every school in the district now qualify for free or reduced-price meals (see table). Thexton said those students also count as at-risk students, which allows the district to qualify for weighted enrollment. That translates to more state aid.
Contributions and grants
In action items Monday, the school board accepted grants and contributions, including $2,324 from the Kansas Department of Transportation Traffic Safety Resource Office to the Great Bend High School Robotic Club for its involvement with the Seatbelts Are For Everyone (S.A.F.E.) program. The teen-run program educated peers on the importance of seat belt use, the hazards of underage drinking and the effects of driving while impaired. It also raised motorcycle safety awareness and stressed the importance of wearing a seat belt to reduce the number of motor vehicle-related injuries and fatalities among Kansas teens.
Also approved:
• Food Service Director Kristy Alvord applied for and will accept a Kansas State Department of Education 2019 Food Service Equipment Assistance Grant for $1,545 that will be used toward the purchase of a Mobile Heated Cabinet.
• The GBHS Vocational Technical Club will receive a $200 contribution from Blackstone Resources LLC.
• The Great Bend Middle School Booster Club has donated $552 to the athletic department to purchase four basketball box-out shields from USA Gymnastics.
Allocation of Title funds
In other business, the board approved the Local Consolidated Plan allocation for state and federal programs, commonly known at Title programs, which amounts to $1,105,916. The total is $37,138 less than last year. Programs with the allocated amounts are:
• Title I A Improving Education Programs, $758,372
• Title I C Migratory Programs, $138,600
• Title II A Supporting Effective Instruction, $120,726
• Title III A English Learner and Immigrant Programs, $49,378
• Title IVA Grants for Student Support and Academic, $38,840
Thexton said the reduction in funds can be found mostly in the funding for migratory programs, and that is because the district saw a decrease in the number of migrant students.
The board also approved the Title VI B and Early Childhood budgets, which covers salaries for licensed special education staff salaries. This was announced previously and the budget application was available for public review for 30 days at the office of the Barton County Cooperative of Special Education.
Free/Reduced Lunch Percentages
School 2018-19 2019-20
Eisenhower 70.69 77.34
Jefferson 48.09 50
Lincoln 59.93 59.68
Park 85.77 82.55
Riley 92.31 94.3
GBMS 65 64.64
GBHS 60.83 61.53
Totals 68.95 70.01


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Okwui
Enwezor
writer and curator, New York
Okwui Enwezor is a curator, critic, poet, and the director of the Haus der Kunst, Munich, Germany. In 2015 Enwezor was the artistic director of 56th Venice Biennale. In addition to writing extensively on contemporary African art and artists, as well as on American and international art, he regularly writes books, edits publications, and contributes his writing to periodicals such as Artforum, Frieze, Parkett, Texte zur Kunst, and Third Text. He has curated and co-curated numerous ground-breaking exhibitions around the world including: 7th Gwangju Biennale, Gwangju, 2008; Archive Fever: Uses of the Document in Contemporary Art, International Center of Photography (ICP), New York, 2008; Documenta 11, Kassel 2002; and The Short Century: Independence and Liberation Movements in Africa, 1945–1994, Museum Villa Stuck, Munich, Gropius Bau, Berlin, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, and P.S.1 and Museum of Modern Art, New York, 2001. He received the Award for Curatorial Excellence from the Center for Curatorial Studies, Bard College, New York in 2009. Enwezor lives and works in and New York. [Last updated 2016]
5-7 November 2009
1st FORMER WEST Congress
Former West
FORMER WEST: Art and the Contemporary After 1989


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About SketchUp 2013 and the meaning of "free"
Most CAD and 3D-related websites have already gone over SketchUp 2013 by now. I'm not into repeating all of this, so this is more a personal reflection.
SketchUp has become widely successful for many (valid) reasons. When I discovered SketchUp for the first time, they were at release 2 and ran by @Last software, who had lots of prior CAD experience. I remember suggesting to introduce it into our CAAD classes and we got a classroom license just a day or two before the first lesson. I quickly created some HTML overview pages and we were running. It will not come as a surprise that the software was a huge success.
Reason for success: simple to use, quick modelling (push-pull!) and well-thought out graphical display styles, without jeopardising accuracy (inferences, axis locking).
When Google took over, there were some hesitations, but overall the result was very positive: a free version became available, the 3D Warehouse was only in its infancy, but grew at a tremendous speed, integration into Google Earth was cool.
Reason for success: free to use, integration with Googles 3D Warehouse + Google Earth.
While the pace of updates slowed down, they managed to include some serious functionality: photomatch, layout (with interactive 3D views) and extensibility with Ruby scripts.
Then Trimble took over (April 2012) and while something of a surprise, they managed to change the SketchUp logo and now release a really new version 2013. They kept Pro and rebranded the free version into MAKE. But while functionally, they deliver a good new version, they introduced an important distinction in licensing. The free, eh... MAKE version of SketchUp is not for commercial use. If you produce any model or illustration that is used in a commercial context, you need a Pro license.
I'm wondering how many non-CAD users where using the free version in a commercial context. Because, let's face it, the Pro version was primarily targeted at architects and engineers, with DWG/DXF support, PDF output and scaled printing, alongside Layout. For Game developers and visual artists, the free version seemed to lack mostly FBX export (though Collada was usable) and the Solid tools.
So if you were using SketchUp 8 Free in a commercial context, would you update to SketchUp 2013 Pro? Stick with version 8? Or use MAKE and ignore the licensing terms?